Separation of Curium from Neutron Irradiated Am-241

Abstract

The conditions under which curium can be separated fro111 irradiated ?"Am t a r g r t wvrr vlucidated. The isolation process consists of three steps: I n tlie first step, Ani(a) is oxidizcd to pentavalent state i n a dilute nitric acid solution. a n d t h e n plutonium a n d curium a i r e xtracb-tl from t h e irradiated target by solvent extraction with IIDEHP. Curium in tlie organic pliase is back-extracted with 1 N nitric acid, a n d thereafter plutonium with a r e~l u c i n g solution (wntnining fcrro:is sulfamate. T h e curium is finally purificd by cation exchange, using a-hy-(lrosy isobntyratr a s t h e eluting solution. About 0.4, p g of "'Cm a n d 4x 10-3 p g of " G I w e r r found i n t h e curium fraction, which had been separated from 1 tng of irradiated ?'!Am sainplc.

Separation of Transplutonium Elements from Neutron Irradiated Americium-241

“…The target assembly was placed in a monitoring core of JMTR and irradiated intermittently for a total of 409 days, from May 1970 to June 1971, at a thermal neutron flux of 2 X 10 14 n/cm 2 •sec. The integrated thermal neutron flux was estimated to be 3 X 10 21 nvt.…”